Jack by Alphonse Daudet (web ebook reader txt) 📖

hear the cry of "Stop him! Stop him!" At last he climbed over the bank and began to run on the narrow path by the water's edge. The day was coming to an end. The river was very high and yellow from recent rains, the water rolled heavily against the arches of the bridge, and the wind curled it in little waves, the tops of which were just touched by the level rays of the setting sun. Women passed him bearing baskets of wet linen, fishermen drew in their lines, and a whole river-side population, sailors and bargemen, with their rounded shoulders and woollen hoods, hurried past him. With these there was still another class, rough and ferocious of aspect, who were quite capable of pulling you out of the Seine for fifteen francs, and of throwing you in again for a hundred sous. Occasionally one of these men would turn to look at this slender schoolboy who seemed in such a hurry.
The appearance of the shore was continually changing. In one place it was black, and long planks were laid to boats laden with charcoal. Farther on, similar boats were crowded with fruit, and a delicious odor of fresh orchards was wafted on the air. Suddenly there was a look of a great harbor; steamboats were loading at the wharves; a few rods more, and a group of old trees bathed their distorted roots in a limpid stream, and one could easily fancy one's self twenty leagues from Paris, and in an earlier century.
But night was close at hand.
The arches of the bridges vanished in darkness; the bank was deserted, and illuminated only by that vague light which comes from even the very darkest body of water.
But still the child toiled on, and at last found himself on a long wharf, covered with warehouses and piled with merchandise. He had reached Bercy, but it was night, and he was filled with terror lest he should be stopped at the gate; but the little fugitive was hardly noticed. He passed the barrier without hindrance, and soon found himself in a long, narrow street, solitary and dimly lighted. While the child was in the life and motion of the city, he was terrified only by one thought, and that was that Moronval would find him. Now he was still afraid, but his fear was of another character--born of silence and solitude.
Yet the place where he now found himself was not the country. The street was bordered with houses on both sides, but as the child slowly toiled on, these buildings became farther and farther apart, and considerably lower in height. Although barely eight o'clock, this road was almost deserted. Occasional pedestrians walked noiselessly over the damp ground, while the dismal howling of a dog added to the cheerlessness of the scene. Jack was troubled. Each step that he took led him further from Paris, its light and its noise. He reached the last wineshop. A broad circle of light barred the road, and seemed to the child the limits of the inhabited world.
After he had passed that shop, he must go on in the dark. Should he go into the shop and ask his way? He looked in. The proprietor was seated at his desk; around a small table sat two men and a woman, drinking and talking. When Jack lifted the latch, they looked up; the three had hideous faces--such faces as he had seen at the police stations the day they were looking for Madou. The woman, above all, was frightful.
"What does he want?" said one of the men.
The other rose; but little Jack with one bound leaped the stream of light from the open door, hearing behind him a volley of abuse. The darkness now seemed to the child a refuge, and he ran on quickly until he found himself in the open country. Before him stretched field after field; a few small, scattered houses, white cubes, alone varied the monotony of the scene. Below was Paris, known by its long line of reddish vapor, like the reflection of a blacksmith's forge. The child stood still. It was the first time that he had ever been alone out of doors at night. He had neither eaten nor drank all day, and was now suffering from intense thirst. He was also beginning to understand what he had undertaken.
Had he strength enough to reach his mother?
He finally decided to lie down in a furrow in the bank on the side of the road, and sleep there until daybreak. But as he went toward the spot he had selected, he heard heavy breathing, and saw that a man was stretched out there, his rags making a confused mass of dark shadow against the white stones.
Jack stood petrified, his heart in his mouth, unable to take a step forward or back. At this instant the sleeping figure began to move, and to talk, still without waking. The child thought of the woman in the wine-shop, and feared that this creature was she, or some other equally repulsive.
The shadows all about were now to his fancy peopled with these frightful beings. They climbed over the bank, they barred his further progress. If he extended his hand to the right or the left, he felt certain that he should touch them. A light and a voice aroused the child from this stupor. An officer, accompanied by his orderly, bearing a lantern, suddenly appeared.
"Good evening, gentlemen," said the child, gently, breathless with emotion.
The soldier who carried the lantern raised it in the direction of the voice.
"This is a bad hour to travel, my boy," remarked the officer; "are you going far?"
"O, no, sir; not very far," answered Jack, who did not care to tell the truth.
"Ah, well! we can go on together as far as Charenton."
What a delight it was to the child to walk for an hour at the side of these two honest soldiers, to regulate his steps by theirs, and to see the cheerful light from the lantern! From the soldier, too, he casually learned that he was on the right road.
"Now we are at home," said the officer, halting suddenly. "Good night. And take my advice, my lad, and don't travel alone again at night--it is not safe." And with these parting words, the men turned up a narrow lane, swinging the lantern, leaving Jack alone at the entrance of the principal street in Charenton. The child wandered on until he found himself on the quay; he crossed a bridge which seemed to him to be thrown over an abyss, so profound were the depths below. He lingered for a moment, but rough voices singing and laughing so startled him that he took to his heels and ran until he was out of breath, and was again in the open fields. He turned and looked back; the red light of the great city was still reflected on the horizon. Afar off he heard the grinding of wheels. "Good!" said the child; "something is coming." But nothing appeared. And the invisible wagon, whose wheels moved apparently with difficulty, turned down some unseen lane.
Jack toiled on slowly. Who was that man that stood waiting for him at the turning of the road? One man! Nay, there were two or three. But they were trees,--tall, slender poplars,--or a clump of elms--those lovely old elms which grow to such majestic beauty in France; and Jack was environed by the mysteries of nature,--nature in the springtime of the year, when one can almost hear the grass grow, the buds expand, and the earth crackle as the tender herbage shoots forth. All these faint, vague noises bewildered little Jack, who began to sing a nursery rhyme with which his mother formerly rocked him to sleep.
It was pitiful to hear the child, alone in the darkness, encouraging himself by these reminiscences of his happy, petted infancy. Suddenly the little trembling voice stopped.
Something was coming--something blacker than the darkness itself, sweeping down on the child as if to swallow him up. Cries were heard; human voices, and heavy blows. Then came a drove of enormous cattle, which pressed against little Jack on all sides; he feels the damp breath from their nostrils; their tails switch violently, and the heat of their bodies, and the odor of the stable, is almost stifling. Two boys and two dogs are in charge of these animals; the dogs bark, and the uncouth peasants yell, until the noise is appalling.
As they pass on, the child is absolutely stupefied by terror. These animals have gone, but will there not be others? It begins to rain, and Jack, in despair, fails on his knees, and wishes to die. The sound of a carriage, and the sight of two lamps like friendly eyes coming quickly toward him, revives him suddenly. He calls aloud.
The carriage stops. A head, with a travelling cap drawn closely down over the ears, bends forward to ascertain the whereabouts of the shrill cry.
"I am very tired," pleaded Jack; "would you be so kind as to let me come into your carriage?"
The man hesitated, but a woman's voice came to the child's assistance. "Ah, what a little fellow I Let him come in here."
"Where are you going?" asked the traveller.
The child hesitated. Like all fugitives, he wished to hide his destination. "To Villeneuve St George," he answered, nervously.
"Come on, then," said the man, with gruff kindness.
The child was soon curled up under a comfortable travelling rug, between a stout lady and gentleman, who both examined him curiously by the light of the little lamp.
Where was he going so late, and all alone, too? Jack would have liked to tell the truth, but he was in too great fear of being carried back to the Institute. Then he invented a story to suit the occasion. His mother was very ill in the country, where she was visiting. He had been told of this the night before, and he had at once started off on foot, because he had not patience to wait for the next day's train.
"I understand," said the lady. And the gentleman looked as if he understood also, but made many wise observations as to the imprudence of running about the country alone, there were so many dangers. Then he was asked in what house in Villeneuve his mother's friends resided.
"At the end of the town," answered Jack, promptly,--"the last house on the right."
It was lucky that his rising color was hidden by the darkness. His cross-examination, however, was by no means over. The husband and wife were great talkers, and, like all great talkers, extremely curious, and could not be content until they had learned the private affairs of all those persons with whom they came in contact. They kept a little store, and each Saturday went into the country to get rid of the dust of the week; but they were making money, and some day would live altogether at Soisy-sous-Etiolles.
"Is that place far from Etiolles?" asked Jack, with a start.
"O, no, close by," answered the gentleman, giving a friendly cut with his whip to his beast.
What a fatality for Jack! Had he not told the falsehood, he could have gone on in this comfortable carriage, have rested his poor little weary legs, and had a comfortable sleep, wrapped in the good woman's shawl, who asked him, every little while, if he was warm enough.
If he could but summon courage enough to say, "I have told you a falsehood; I am going to the same place that you are;" but he was unwilling to incur the contempt and distrust of these good people; yet, when they told him that they had reached Villeneuve, the child could not restrain a sob.
"Do not cry,